Woody Harrelson loves bringing famous friends together for dinner

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The Hunger Games star invited Dern to join him for dinner over the weekend and only when she got to the restaurant did she realise she'd be sitting across the table from rocker Bono while top chef Mario Batali cooked for them.

"That's what it's like to be around Woody," she chuckles. "He says, 'Let's just go get food'. I was in jeans just getting off the plane. He says, 'Totally, just come here', and I said to somebody, 'Isn't that Mario Batali's restaurant?'

"I get there and say, 'Hi, I'm here to get a bite with my friend', and there's Mario Batali to feed us! Only Woody takes you to a restaurant where we're being fed by him! I had too much anxiety to even eat."

And Woody reveals the evening was extra special when Bono showed up to toast the late Chuck Berry.

"Somebody brought up Chuck Berry, and I didn't know that he had died," the actor recalls. "Bono stood up and he goes, 'What about a man who could write Roll over Beethoven and tell Tchaikovsky the news. Who comes up with that? That's not regular pop'."

Bono proceeded to give his fellow diners a music history lesson about the importance of the rock 'n' roll icon, who passed away on Saturday (18Mar17), aged 90.

"Obviously Chuck Berry had such a huge influence on so many musicians," Woody tells WENN. "I never knew how much The Rolling Stones were affected by Chuck Berry. What a legacy."